吃虧

to suffer losses / to come to grief / to lose out / to get the worst of it / to be at a disadvantage / unfortunately

to eat / to consume / to eat at (a cafeteria etc) / to eradicate / to destroy / to absorb / to suffer / to stammer (Taiwan pr. for this sense is [ji2])

variant of 吃[chi1]

deficiency / deficit / luckily / it's lucky that... / (often ironically) fancy that...

see 貨比三家不吃虧|货比三家不吃亏[huo4 bi3 san1 jia1 bu4 chi1 kui1]

to be taken advantage of

(idiom) ignore your elders at your peril

shop around first and you won't get ripped off (idiom)